The human visual system experiences “flicker fusion” when images are presented in rapid succession. When a viewer sees a series of images in sequence at a high enough frequency, the images combine to create an illusion of motion and continuity. For example, a movie is a sequence of images, called frames, that are projected on a screen with sufficient rapidity to create the illusion of motion and continuity. The frames of movies are typically displayed to viewers at a rate of 24 frames per second. Other frame rates can also be used, e.g., many television systems present 30 frames per second, where each frame is divided into two fields of interlaced lines, giving a display rate of 60 fields per second.
Subtitles are textual versions of sound and dialog in movies, films, and television programs. Subtitles are often displayed at the bottom of a screen for the hearing impaired or for viewers who understand a foreign language, enabling them to enjoy a show that they otherwise could not understand. Subtitles must be large enough to be readable, and typically obscure a portion of the video content. Subtitles may thus be objectionable to viewers that can hear and understand the dialog.
International travel is becoming easier and more affordable. At the same time, the number of public venues, such as theme parks, attracting international audiences is increasing. Video presentations are commonly used at public venues to educate and to entertain. A problem arises when people (e.g., from different countries) wish to view, for example, a movie at the same time. A typical movie includes a video portion and an audio portion, where the audio portion includes a dialog in a certain language. At least some of the people will likely wish to view the presentation with subtitles, while others would object to the subtitles. Moreover, speakers of different languages would wish to view different subtitles, but there is a practical limit to how many subtitles may be added to a video without detracting substantially from the video presentation.
There are also other contexts in which different viewers wish to view different video content at the same time on a given display. For example, simultaneous multiplayer video games require all players to interact with the game at the same time (i.e. first-person shooters or racing games). When played on a single console and display, the display must be fragmented into sectors, each of which shows a different player's view. This both reduces the resolution of the display per viewer and allows opposing players to spy on one another's private viewpoint.
The authors are unaware of any prior art systems or methods that can adequately address these difficulties.